The trout is prized as a gamefish because it’s picky. It’s selective. Often, it requires a refined presentation to fool a wild trout. And in large part, that’s the draw toward fishing for them.

In every region, in every stream, trout habits can differ from others in neighboring watersheds. And across the fishing landscape, we find places and even moments when trout are more picky — more choosy — about what, where and how they want to eat their food.

We’ve all seen fishing change in just a few minutes. We’ve happened upon bite windows, or periods of time with trout feeding more regularly, where we happen to have the right fly and the right presentation to meet the preferences of those fish. Likewise, we’ve all had a good thing going, where we’re catching trout quickly, and it all just shuts down.

So there’s a lot to this idea of selectivity.

And in this episode, we dig into what makes a trout selective. The quick answer is the theory that angler pressure makes trout more picky. There is no doubt about it. For sure, our fishing, our presentations educate the already picky trout what not eat, where and when.

But many other reasons for selectivity are natural. Meaning, they have nothing to do with anglers fishing for trout. These factors, like low water, stable water temperatures and the prevalence of one easy food form, can also make an already picky, tough to catch fish, even tougher.

This is a good topic.

My friends, Matt Grobe, Dr. Trevor Smith and Austin Dando join me for a great discussion.

Resources

PODCAST: Troutbitten | Angler Pressure ONE - What it Does to the Fish - S7, Ep1
PODCAST: Troutbitten | Angler Pressure TWO- What it Does to the Fishing - S7, Ep2
READ: Troutbitten | We Don't Want Easy Fishing

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Paul Donovan, "Profit and Prejudice: The Luddites of the Fourth Industrial Revolution" (Routledge, 2020)